Tuesday, February 15, 2011

To see what is right, and not to do it, is want of courage or of principle

--Confucius

One of the greatest abilities of the human mind seems to be the ability to completely ignore that which we know to be true, especially if we believe that accepting that truth and acting appropriately will cause any pain, anxiety or stress (and sometimes just minor inconvenience). To wit: over the weekend I finally got around to watching the documentary Food, Inc. For those not familiar, it's a documentary about the business of food in America, and isn't very pretty. Basically if you eat anything from a grocery store, fast food outlet, or most restaurants, you're participating in a system that not only causes tremendous amounts of suffering for animals, but is responsible for destroying small farms, harming the environment, contributing to the oil crisis, putting all kinds of chemicals (including poisons) in what we eat and drink, and creating food that is not just unhealthy but can be downright dangerous. It's also a system that perpetuates government corruption, gives billions of dollars to a very small handful of corporations who are only gaining more and more control over what we eat and drink, and it's all only getting worse. It's one of those documentaries where you can't help but be outraged, and more than a little sick. It makes you want to change everything - which is exactly why I've been purposefully avoiding it since it came out in 2008.

To really change my behavior the way the facts of the matter tell me I should basically means completely changing how and what I eat. First of all, forget about all fast-food/casual dining restaurants, and pretty much all sit-down restaurants as well. Secondly, any beef I eat is going to have to be grass-fed, and any chicken has to be free-range. That's not cheap. I can eat fish, but there are so many toxins in our fish now that you're only supposed to have it a couple of times a week. Also, all my produce (and the meat too, for that matter) should only be sourced locally or come from farmers' markets (did I mention I live in Chicago?) because of the amount of gas needed to drive our food everywhere (the average meal takes about 1500 miles to get from the farm to your plate). Taken all together, that's an immense shift in my day-to-day life, and I honestly don't know if I'm up for it.

The same thing happened a couple of years ago, when I spent a week at a Buddhist monastery in upstate New York. Buddhist views on diet vary, but for the most part practicing Buddhists tend to be vegetarians or vegans. This is not because the Buddha said "Thou Shalt Not Eat Meat," because he didn't (Buddhism really isn’t about "Thou Shalt's" so much as it is "it might be helpful if…" or "you might want to consider…"). It's because almost everything in Buddhism revolves around and comes out of the continued practice of mindfulness, of being completely present and aware at all times. When you work, you work mindfully; when you walk, you walk mindfully; and when you eat, you eat mindfully. And when you truly eat mindfully, you can't help but think about the suffering that the animal went through and the fear they must have felt (let alone all the chemicals and toxins and the environmental stuff), and it immediately makes it impossible to continue. I really can't describe the sensation accurately, it's like actually tasting pain and fear (it tastes a little like a McRib (Zing!)).

Near the end of my stay there, I began to wonder if I was actually going to be able to go back to consuming meat and animal products, of being an active participant in the torture of my animal brothers and sisters and the continued destruction of our shared environment. I strongly considered turning vegan for all of about 48 hours, but the minute I got to the airport to fly home, where do you think was the first place I hit after I got through security? Wendy's. For a double hamburger. There was a brief outcry from my conscience of "This is wrong! You know you can't be doing this!" which I promptly, and consciously, ignored. I simply turned it off. Which I do a lot of. I really try to be mindful, as long as it's not too inconvenient. I did it for years as a smoker (I finally quit a little over two years ago, which I attribute greatly to practicing mindfulness), and I'm doing it with the food thing now and, to a certain extent, I do it with my employment.

Right Livelihood is one of the eight elements of Buddha's Noble Eightfold Path, and it is loosely defined as not engaging in a trade or occupation that, directly or indirectly, results in harm for other living beings. Well, not only does working in the restaurant industry mean I'm an active participant in the whole U.S. corporate-food monstrosity, I'm also contributing to obesity, diabetes and heart disease (especially the chain-restaurant where I work, which is basically little more than a fat and sugar meth lab), let alone the obscene amount of food we waste. But what am I supposed to do? Drop out of the system? Completely change everything about how I live? If everyone who had a job that indirectly caused harm to any other living being stopped working, it would destroy the world economy. All of mankind would have to completely rethink how we relate to each other and the way we structure society. It would do nothing short of change the world. And I don't know about you, but I'm not ready for that. I want my McRib.

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

"I'm not happy, I'm not happy," nobody's happy OK? Happiness comes in small doses folks; it's a cigarette or a chocolate chip cookie or a 5 second orgasm. You c**, you eat the cookie, you smoke the butt, you go to sleep, you get up in the morning and go to f***ing work. That is it, end of f***ing list.

-Dennis Leary

¨

There is no way to happiness. Happiness is the way.

-The Buddha

¨

I've been on a hot streak at work lately: lots of good tips and smooth shifts, to the point where I've really enjoyed being at work. Don't get me wrong, I don't hate waiting tables, but I usually don't actively enjoy it either. It's something I do to earn a living - I show up, I do my job, I go home. And sometimes it can be incredibly frustrating. It often feels like the bad days outweigh the good, mainly because it's so easy for things to go wrong. In-between days are the rule, but the "great" shift, the shifts where you walk away saying what a great day you had, those are rare.

So I started wondering what had to occur for me to have that "great" shift, what elements had to come together. This is how it broke down:

Smoothness: By this I mean all my support systems, the things I rely on to get my job done, are getting done. Food is coming out of the kitchen in a timely fashion, bread is sliced and ready to go, the bakery and bar aren't weeded themselves, clean glasses, plateware and silverware are readily available, etc. I have all the tools I need to do my job, and I'm not kept waiting for anything - I can grab what I need and go.

Clientele: Everyone's nice and friendly. To clarify: I'm not looking to be best friends with my guests - I've never been one of those "So, what have you got planned for the weekend?" type of servers. I don't care. I don't want to get involved, I just bring the food. I just mean people treat me with a modicum of respect and aren't demonstrably rude. That's enough.

Tips: Here's the thing, it's not just about money. I've had very lucrative shifts that were an absolute shit show to get through; shifts where I was running my ass and one step behind all night. Yeah, I made money, but I had to kill myself to get it. It all comes down to the B/D ratio (Bullshit to Dollar). There is a certain amount of bullshit I will put up with for a certain amount of money. Kitchen's crashed and I can't get bread? If I make $200, I can overlook that. If I get run all night and only make $120, it's a lot harder to swallow than if I do nothing and make $100, even though I'm making less money. Of course, if I make anything less than $120 on a dinner shift, it's still hard to qualify as a good night.

So, if it takes all these elements coming together: the kitchen, support systems, clientele, tips, etc, for me to have a "great" shift, how many great shifts do you think I have? Not very many. Odds are, some element is going to be missing. So is that a good recipe for happiness? Not really, especially considering how many elements are outside of my control. When we pin our happiness on anything outside of ourselves and our own attitude, we're just setting ourselves up for disappointment, time and time again. What's the solution? I think it's to make happiness itself the priority, rather than these other things that need to happen for me to be happy. It's an experiment I've been trying with varying degrees of success - going into my shift with the attitude that come hell or high water, I'm going to stay in a good mood, that that's the most important thing. Because when you get right down to it, wouldn't you rather be in a good mood than a bad one? Not to sound Pollyanna, but doesn't it make you happier to, well, be happy? It takes a lot acceptance and a lot of letting go. Shitty tip? Let it go. 10-minute margarita? Let it go. Dirty silverware, mis-run food, rude guests? Let it all go. At the end of the day, it's only food. I spend 32-40 hours of my life a week at work, between 1500 and 2000 hours a year. That's the equivalent of 80 24-hour days, or 125 days of 16-hour waking time per calendar year. That's waaaay too much of life to just write off.

About Me

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